There’s really light at the end of the tunnel, even if it’s 6 years away. The long-planned express rail line from Paris to Charles de Gaulle Airport got final approval last week from the French Senate and National Assembly.
For anyone who’s taken the sometimes slow and often-delayed RER commuter line between airport and city, or has dealt with other traffic-laden alternatives, the good news is that the new line will be a 20-minute non-stop run from Gare de l’Est to the airport. The bad news is that it will cost €24 one-way, compared to €10 for the commuter train.
The line will run partly on existing express track, and partly on new rail shown as dashed on the map above. You’ll also notice some other dotted lines on the map: those are parts of a major regional Métro expansion to be built over the next years. One line will eventually reach the airport, too.
The new line, to be jointly built by the airport authority and SNCF, the national rail operator, will cost about €1.69 billion. The timing of the approval comes in part because it’s also seen as part of Paris’s application for the 2024 Olympics.
